


Whumptober 2019: Stephen Strange

by bold_seer



Category: Doctor Strange (2016), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Alternate Universe - Canon, Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Canon Compliant, Closeted Character, Ficlet Collection, Gen, Hurt Stephen Strange, Injury, M/M, Multi, Obsession, POV Stephen Strange, Whump, Whumptober
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-04
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2020-11-08 13:10:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20836016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bold_seer/pseuds/bold_seer
Summary: 1.Scars- Stephen & Wong + de-aging2.Hiding- Stephen/Tony/Pepper + closeted character3.Lost- Stephen + aftermath of accident4.Dragged Away- Stephen & Tony + aftermath of torture





	1. Scars (Day 15) - Stephen & Wong + de-aging

**Author's Note:**

> [Whumptober 2019](https://whumptober2019.tumblr.com)
> 
> prompts (Day 1-31): [list](https://66.media.tumblr.com/8c9477fa6ab570103a999584f0af740f/tumblr_px0h8sTy2U1xisd2ao1_540.jpg)  
alternative prompts (Alt 1-16): [list](https://66.media.tumblr.com/6b492e52bd07fb634984d72609452fc7/9580e1aa62a3d39f-e2/s540x810/6461941fa93096e4d7dad4451f334355a2ab45d5.jpg)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I’m not a child,” Strange protested.

The voice calling out was faint and uncertain, but still carried. With a deep frown on his face, Wong formed a portal to the room, where he found a pale, skinny boy, no older than eight. He had dark hair and light eyes, and was wearing something similar to what Strange had worn. The Cloak of Levitation hung in the air, larger than before, unchanged.

Strange met him with wordless petulance and unease.

Throwing an unimpressed look at the teacup beside his scrolls, Wong turned to the texts laid out on the desk. The pages provided no immediate answers, but made him think of Mordo, how easily he would defeat Strange now. He put the volume down. “You should stay at Kamar-Taj, for the time being.”

“I’m not a child,” Strange protested. “I’m a doctor.” As expected. He always had to do things his own stubborn way.

Wong took a deep breath. “I won’t treat you like a child. You only look like one.” _And sometimes the taller version of you acts like one, doing the opposite of what he’s meant to._ The frown never left his face. Strange seemed to have retained his memories, but something else was odd. “Your hands.” They were small, belonged to a child, and yet no different.

“My hands?” Strange didn’t bother to hide his defensiveness and disbelief. “Not the issue. In case it escaped your notice: I’m thirty-five years younger than _me_.”

He kept eye contact, until Strange dropped his gaze. “What am I meant to be looking at?” Strange held up his hands, which had once been an obsession. Had led him to - and almost kept him from - the Mystic Arts. “Seven operations, none successful. Severe nerve and bone damage. Inoperable and permanent, scars included.”

Strange spoke with a factual coldness that would’ve been highly unusual for a child. “You’re not eight years old,” Wong replied, his tone even. “Your body has been transformed.”

“Next you’ll tell me it’s psychosomatic.” The retort was both childish and so very like Strange that Wong almost rolled his eyes. A biting answer was fast on his tongue, but Strange continued, “Am I supposed to spend decades growing into myself?” For someone who’d turned around time, managed to defeat Dormammu, he seemed afraid of being thrown backwards. Starting over.

He should’ve given Strange a stern talking-to, no less than he deserved and probably what he needed. Instead, Wong sighed. He didn’t want Stephen to suffer, but acknowledge the gravity of the situation, without giving up hope. “Almost every spell has a counterspell.”

Strange huffed, impatient as ever. “When?”

The temptation was strong to order Strange to stay in his room, no books and misconduct. Wong was reminded of himself and Mordo, catching Strange in the library. A misbehaving child, up after lights. If he knew Strange at all, he needed the sleep. Wong could do with some rest. His responsibility was guarding books. Strange was an adult, able to look after himself. He wasn’t eight. These were truths and half-truths, boxes inside one another, leading to an unassured guess. “A week, a month.”

“Years,” Strange challenged him. “Forever?” He had an inclination towards the melodramatic.

The boy, the _man_, trying his patience. Perhaps this was appropriate, time to reflect on caution. Despite sniping at each other, there was rarely any real anger under Wong’s irritation. Even at his most aggravating, it was a lie to say Wong disliked Strange.

“Not a kid,” Strange mumbled. “If I’ve messed up, you don’t have to pretend.”

Wong nodded curtly, but Strange didn’t look up. He was carefully bending his fingers, captivated by the one physical reminder of his adult self, the marks running down his fingers and hands. There was no reason to assume Strange didn’t possess some of his power. Mystic Arts were, above all, a mental exercise. Shock left traces, scars inside the mind and spirit. Vulnerability that wasn’t imagined, which Strange covered well, but couldn’t quite keep away.

He formed the portal himself, and waited for Stephen to join him.


	2. Hiding (Alt 9) - Stephen/Tony/Pepper (Stephen/Tony + Tony/Pepper) + closeted character

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Her eyes focused on him. “Does anyone else know?”

Ms Potts - _Pepper_ \- didn’t ask how long he’d been sleeping with Tony, but he didn’t expect her to. She was wearing white: a powerful contrast against the black chair, which made Stephen feel too muted in his grey suit. Business casual they were not, and a darker colour would’ve made a stronger impression. After a while, he said, “Congratulations on the wedding.”

An amused expression settled on Pepper’s face. “He can be a handful.”

“So can I,” Stephen admitted, not averting his gaze. He wondered what exactly she knew about his arrangement with Tony. What Tony had told her, what she’d worked out. They had recognised something in one another, but Stephen doubted they fulfilled the same function in Tony’s life. She didn’t seem the type. But then, neither did Stephen.

Her eyes focused on him. “Does anyone else know?”

“Know what,” he replied, tone flat, between defensive and hostile, though he _knew_. His interest in men. His preferences. Pepper had no reason to consider Stephen a threat, but he had to play this _right_. Tony was only a part of it. The losses would spiral, as his carefully protected persona crumbled.

He could see his mistake, glaringly obvious, red on light scrubs. He’d assumed it would be equally embarrassing for them, if something got out. Now it hit him that Tony, if anyone, media darling, could turn an issue into a non-issue, an advantage. An open relationship, multiple relationships, another man? Tony was liberal and didn’t conform to people’s expectations. Any other proclivities - bossy sub, curious switch, dominant playboy - would add to the allure.

Stephen displayed his expertise on CNN. It wasn’t finance or law, but medicine was conservative. Surgery. Neurosurgery. The truth wouldn’t destroy his reputation, but damage it. Distract from his accomplishments. Instead of interpreting him as a flirt who didn’t bother following through, or strictly business, or there being something unresolved between him and Christine, people would question everything about him. Even his abilities.

The first time - he had let Tony, or Tony had persuaded him, or maybe Stephen had wanted it, giving off signals. Tony had fucked him and it had been an embarrassingly revelatory experience. Rain and sunshine, at the same time. He understood why it would be pleasurable. He was a doctor. It didn’t mean being submissive, which wasn’t being weak. But he knew he wasn’t supposed to want it, that it would always be worse. Acknowledging it to himself was difficult enough. Everyone knowing?

“Doctor Strange.” The voice was unfamiliar, on another planet. He was far away, in space, in the dark, surrounded by his own fears. Someone’s hands were touching the glass table. He saw the ring. His chest hurt. “Stephen,” Pepper addressed him gently.

He shook his head. “I’m fine. Thank you.”

Pepper gave him a sad, tight smile. “I’ve managed Tony’s - before.” He assumed _indiscretions_, before he realised she probably meant _panic attacks_. It wasn’t that. He closed his eyes. Opened them. She was still there. Her presence, the steely empathy, reminded him of Christine. Different complications. “Why don’t we get to know each other better?”

Instead of biting back, the way he had, in the past, when someone had closed in on uncomfortable truths, Stephen let himself breathe out. “Business or pleasure?”

“Tony likes to mix the two,” said Pepper lightly. “Take out the trash, leave the treasures.” Her expression turned serious again. “Everyone deserves allies.”


	3. Lost (Alt 6) - Stephen + aftermath of accident

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> E was an average letter, made of four sticks.

Raindrops were glittering on the window panes, bright crystals, sharp as glass. Roads dark and sliding. Oblivious of the world outside, Stephen peered at the crossword.

It was the wrong date, wrong day, and he could’ve solved it in under two minutes. That square needed an E, the next an R, which made his thoughts drift to Christine. Her butcher shop had sewn him together, but he needed to be more than Pinocchio with strings. Noise and rush were far from perfect working conditions. Ideal for stretching a person to their limits, not for developing their capacity to the fullest. Not an environment for discoveries.

His mind hadn’t slowed down. Lying in misery, he’d listed the first thousand digits of pi, a fraction of what he could’ve gone through. Ending on an eight brought him back. The cure was somewhere, above the clouds, at twenty thousand feet. Out of reach, yet it existed. Before the solution, getting something down was like climbing a mountain. Further still to doing anything meaningful.

E was an average letter, made of four sticks. Commonplace and easy, though you could write books without it. Pen in his unbandaged hand, it was mocking him with its absence.

Christine would come by, and he would endure. That shattering awareness that someone who knew him, as he was, could see him in his current state. Compare those two incompatible halves, then and now.

He viewed the crossword, one through sixty-two, every confident answer. The letters were barely legible, scratchy and unsettled, as mangled as his hands.


	4. Dragged Away (Day 6) - Stephen & Tony + aftermath of torture

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Space ship, world’s ending.”

“Space ship, world’s ending.” The sound startled him, and Stephen spun around, facing Stark. His words were casual, but Stark’s focus was intense, inspecting Stephen as if he were an alien piece of equipment. “I’ve had better. _You_ have blood on your -” Stark mirrored the damage over his own face, adding, “Doctor.” An afterthought.

“It’s –” These days, it was nothing out of the ordinary. “Not an issue.”

Stark raised his eyebrows. “Great act, dodging knives. Swallowing swords, if you’re more adventurous. Target girl, guy, whoever doesn’t _actually_ get up close and personal with the pointy ends.”

The air was vibrating with something, tension. Stephen wondered whether Stark was more wary of magic or medicine. His eyes flickered to Stark’s chest, shining like an Infinity Stone in the half-light. “Whatever your protégé thought,” Stephen said, ignoring the pang of nostalgia in his own chest, the discomfort in his throat, “I was a surgeon.” Not only a first love, but a lost love: _was_ and never would be.

“Impressive ego, pretentious -” Stark waved his hand, the broad gesture of a stage magician. Too obvious. “Shtick. You tick all the boxes. Let’s recap. Wearing your unlucky charm got you fun time with Thanos Junior. Worst plan to-day.”

“From the man who brought a teenager to space as his aide. This is the cavalry? Loud, undermanned, overpowered.” Stephen narrowed his eyes. Had he ever been this abrasive, this impossible to deal with? But he didn’t need that answered, not now.

“Nope. And it’s Spider-Man, Newest Avenger.” As Stephen registered it, the guilty expression fled Stark’s face, back to a shield of distrust. “You’ve skipped more updates than that.”

Whatever retort Stephen had prepared disappeared, and he sighed, feeling the exhaustion deep in himself. Though he could name the individual injuries, the truth was, every part of him, _all_ hurt. Pain was an old friend, but some friends you grew tired of. His arms were wrapped around his body, when he noticed Stark studying him with something far too close to sympathy. Stephen grimaced. Voice tight, he asked, “Will you get us back?”

Stark shrugged, _could he, should he_, before taking pity on Stephen. “Do my best. Pinky swear.” He frowned. “Enough time to sit down. Unless you want to fall flat on your ass. In which case: be my guest.”

Despite the attitude, Stark appeared almost concerned. Or, as concerned as someone who had just met Stephen and insulted him at every turn could appear. He held Stephen’s gaze, no pretence, and they were two weary men. After a fight, before another, leaning into that faint, wordless connection.

It was broken by a clash - the cloak, the kid, a _sorry, sorry_ \- and then, Stark was gone.


End file.
